Vienna
by just like our last
Summary: slow down, you crazy child


**Author's Note:** Sorry this is probably full of mistakes, I didn't feel like editing it. Sorry it's a bit late. Happy Easter!

**Disclaimer:** Don't own How to Rock

* * *

Kacey had to admit, the fight with Molly had _not_ been her best idea. And perhaps she would have let it go, perhaps Molly would have been ignored, had she not insulted Gravity 5 in a way that was _definitely_ worthy of the punch across the face Kacey had given her, an insult even more worthy of the heated argument between the two groups that followed. And to be honest, considering all that had gone on, they had been let off easy, save for the fact that their principal's idea of detention was spending Saturday morning on the day before Easter organizing an Easter party for the kids at Brewster Elementary. Still, it wasn't as bad as cleaning the gym floor or helping the librarian catch up on bookkeeping. But it might have been a bit more tolerable if it hadn't meant working with the other half that had been involved in the fight, Grace and Molly.

The Perfs were assigned to decorations, and Molly and Grace quickly left for The Dollar Tree in Molly's car to buy streamers, balloons, and whatever else they might need, so Kacey and the others were left with the peace of not having the Perfs around for at least half an hour or so. Kacey put Stevie and Zander in charge of eggs, and sent Kevin off to buy snacks while she ran around looking for a place to set up the bouncy castle that the school had rented. When Nelson approached her asking what he could do, she told him to set up a snack table for the snacks to go on when Kevin got back with them.

"How many eggs do we need?" Zander asked.

Stevie shrugged. "Enough for a hundred annoying elementary school kids?"

"A _hundred_ kids?"

Stevie shrugged. "Probably more. As far as I know, this party is for grade three and under. I'm just guessing. There could be more than a hundred. We better say two hundred just to be safe."

"But each kid has to be able to collect a basket full of eggs, which is like... fifteen eggs a kid."

Stevie nodded, doing some quick math in her head. "That's... three thousand eggs."

Zander gasped. "Do we even have three thousand eggs?"

"Yeah. Don't worry. The school bought them. All we have to do is fill them all with candy and hide them."

"Do we have enough candy to fill three thousand eggs?"

"I'm not sure... KACEY!" Stevie yelled. From across the field, the African American lifted her head towards the sound of her name.

"YEAH?" She called back.

"WHERE'S THE CANDY?"

"IN THE STORAGE ROOM!"

"...Okay. Storage room. C'mon, Zander," Stevie turned to him again, nodding in thanks back towards Kacey before grabbing the storage room keys from the table in front of them laden with plastic eggs.

The storage room was dark and crowded, and the type of place two people might escape to for a make-out session, which for whatever reason made Stevie feel incredibly awkward. Zander quickly located the box marked "Candy for Easter Party" and moved towards it, crushing Stevie against the wall in his attempt to reach for the box. Stevie gasped, taking in his closeness and the tight squeeze of the little closet, blinking with surprise as she heard the door swung shut behind them.

"Um... what? Like there wasn't little enough space in here. Zander, get off me. I'll get the candy. Open the door," Stevie instructed, reaching towards the box.

Zander fiddled with the door, frowning. "Oh crap... Stevie, it's locked."

"What? Move over!" Quickly, Stevie set the box down again, pushing Zander out of the way as she fiddled with the knob on the door. "What the hell... where's the light switch?" Her hands felt against the wall next to the door in the dark closet until she found the light switch, flicking it on. Both of them blinked as their eyes adjusted to the light, frowning as they studied the lock. Stevie tried it a couple more times, banging on the door in frustration, to no avail. "Yep. Definitely locked." Sighing, she turned to Zander with defeat. "Where's your phone? Call Kacey."

"Um... I don't have it. I left it on the table."

"Shit... I left mine with Kacey."

"Why?"

"She wanted it to take pictures of the set up process, and she doesn't have her's because her parents took it from her as part of her punishment for beating up Molly, so I let her borrow mine." Stevie sighed, sinking down to sit on one of the boxes near the door. "Which was clearly a bad idea."

"Well, then we're stuck in here until Kacey comes to find us wondering what's up," Zander observed.

"Now we're never gonna get the eggs done in time! I mean, what if she never comes? And I have homework to catch up on this afternoon, and an Easter dinner with my relatives tonight! I don't have time for this. It's gonna put me behind on everything," Stevie complained, running her hand through her hair.

"You've been way too busy lately, Stevie. It's not healthy," Zander offered.

"Healthy? Why do you care? Besides, I haven't been any busier than I always was."

"That's a lie, and you know it. You didn't make it to rehearsal yesterday because you were so busy."

"I know, I felt bad about that. I'm sorry I let you guys down. But... I've just had a lot going on with college applications and school and everything else."

"Well, then a few minutes in a closet with nothing to do will do you some good." Zander sat down on a box across from her, offering a smile.

"No, it won't. This will put everything behind schedule and make everyone mad at me and ruin my day! This is awful." She groaned, leaning her head back against the wall.

"Stevie, no one is going to get mad at you. It's not your fault the closet door swung closed." Clearly, Zander was trying to be helpful, but it backfired.

"You're right, Zander. It's _your_ fault. You were behind me. You could have propped it open with your foot or a box or something. Why did you let it close?" Stevie demanded.

"I didn't know it was gonna lock!" Zander argued. "I've never been in this closet before! I didn't know anything about the door!"

Stevie simply rolled her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest.

It wasn't long before the Perfs came back with decorations, and Kacey sent Nelson over to help them. Reluctantly and nervously, Nelson made his way over to Molly and Grace, smiling awkwardly at Grace when she saw him.

"Hi Nelson!" Grace pipped in cheerfully.

"Oh... Nelson. Here, you can carry these," Molly scoffed, handing him two very heavy bags.

"H-hey Grace... What did you buy that weighs _this _much, Molly?" Nelson replied.

Molly shrugged, flipping her hair over her shoulder as she chose a lighter bag for herself to carry. "A lot of things. C'mon, Grace."

A few minutes later, they had unloaded everything from the car, and Molly went to go yell at Kacey for whatever reason, so Nelson and Grace were left alone to start setting up. Grace took out a package of streamers and started stringing them around the edges of Nelson's snack table, motioning Nelson over to help her. "Hold this end, Nelson," she said, struggling with holding both ends of the streamers and taping them up. To Nelson's dismay, the nervousness of being in Grace's presence was enough to cause him to drop the pair of scissors he had been holding to cut streamers onto his foot.

"Ow!" He exclaimed, jumping up into the air.

"Nelson! Are you okay?" Grace asked, a concerned look on her face as she set the streamers down on the table.

"I think so. Ugh." Nelson rubbed his foot, frowning.

Grace looked down at his foot, examining the shoe over it. "Well, you had your shoe on to protect you. You should be okay," She added.

"It was just a pair of scissors. And I don't think it cut through my shoe or anything."

Grace smiled. "That's good." She bent down, picking up the scissors by Nelson's foot, and handed them back to him. When he took them from her, their hands brushed slightly, sending a tingle down Nelson's spine. He sighed inwardly.

"We _have_ to get out of here!" Stevie groaned. "KACEY!" She called out for about the hundredth time, banging her hand on the door.

"You said that already. At least fifty times," Zander replied.

"You know, you _could _help me. You're a guy. You're stronger and louder. You try calling and banging," Stevie retorted, resting a hand on her waist.

Zander got up from the box he was sitting on, moving towards the door. "Fine. Move over." Pushing Stevie out of the way, he did as she instructed, banging and kicking against the door and calling out Kacey's name as loudly as he could. Sighing with defeat, he turned to Stevie, leaning his back against the door. "It's hopeless."

"Great. What are we going to do now?"

"You asked that already. At least fifty times."

Stevie responded by punching him lightly in the arm. "Can it," she mumbled, sinking back onto the box she had been sitting on before.

"...Grace?" Nelson asked, somewhere towards the end of the process of putting streamers up together around the entirety of the courtyard.

"Yeah?"

"Do you hate me?"

"Why would I hate you?" Grace asked, slightly defensively.

Nelson shrugged. "You're a Perf. Aren't you supposed to hate all of Gravity 5?"

"You're thinking of Molly. I don't _really_ hate you guys. I just kinda pretend to so Molly won't get mad."

"Oh... well, good."

"Why? Do you want me to hate you?"

"Definitely not. I... really like you, Grace."

Grace responded with a wide smile. "I really like you too, Nelson."

"Grace?"

"Mmm?"

"I mean as_ more_ than friends."

Grace blushed.

Stevie ended up in a sort of trance, half asleep and half awake as she listened to Zander tap his fingers and knuckles on the side of a metallic box next to him in various rhythms that she finds surprisingly soothing. Her eyes had just closed and she had just started to drift off completely, when, to her surprise, Zander starts singing.

"Slow down, you crazy child..."

Stevie raised her head. "Zander, what are you doing?" She asked groggily, but her only response was a finger brought to Zander's lips, indicating for her to be quiet as he continues softly singing the lyrics to _Vienna_ by Billy Joel.

"When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?" He sang, smiling at her as he finished the verse of the song. "You're working too hard, Stevie. We'll wait for you. Try to spend more time with your friends, and less time worrying about your future. It's going to be fine. You'll always have me. And Kevin, Nelson, and Kacey, too. Okay?" Taking her hand in his, he looked her in the eyes, genuinely concerned. "I just don't want you to wear yourself out."

Stevie blinked, cocking her head slightly at him, not entirely sure what to say. "...Thanks," she managed, ducking her head to avoid holding eye contact with him for too long, though he still held her hand in his. Zander took his other hand and rested it under her chin, bringing her head up to look into his eyes again.

They didn't say anything. They just held each other's gazes, lost in each other's eyes, seemingly forgetting the fact that they were trapped in a closet. Stevie may have been in a bit of a half-asleep trance a few minutes ago, but this was an entirely different type of trance, and as they both leaned towards each other, closing their eyes and not entirely sure what they were doing, their lips mere inches apart...

"Why are you guys still in here?" Kacey's voice called out, the door of the closet swinging open. Zander and Stevie broke apart and were on their feet in less than a second, their faces both bright red as Kacey looked from one to the other frowning.

"Um... We were locked in," Stevie muttered, trying to regain herself, mentally cursing Kacey for interrupting... whatever had been about to happen.

"Really? I didn't know it locked from the inside," Kacey replied. "Sorry. I probably should have come looking for you guys earlier. Well, c'mon, most of the other decorations are set up, and Kevin just got back with the food. Grab the candy. We still have three thousand eggs to stuff and hide."

For the rest of the day, Stevie and Zander avoided each other as much as possible, and Kacey caught Nelson and Grace sneaking away from the group to hide eggs together alone.


End file.
